“We answer to a higher god”

by Wendy Thomson on March 19, 2012


Former Presidential candidate Bob Barr (he ran for the Libertarian Party) has an advocacy group, Liberty Guard, that is suing the TSA for non-compliance with a FOIA request that Liberty Guard filed in 2010. Barr is trying to get TSA documentation about the November 2010 Opt-Out Day. It’s now 2012, and the documents are still not forthcoming.

Once again the TSA has unilaterally decided it is above the law. Just as TSA Administrator John Pistole refused to testify at a Congressional hearing. Just as it has decided it is above the law in refusing citizens the right to sue and have the case heard by a jury of peers. Just as it has decided to ignore Congressional calls for something as simple as independent testing to assure its now-proven-ineffective backscatter machines are not unduly irradiating TSA clerks and passengers.

So far, the TSA has thwarted any attempt to hold it accountable to the country that affords it a budget (and the word “afford” is used in the broadest and most charitable of terms).

I’m not exactly sure to what ‘higher God” the TSA believes it’s accountable to. Surely not Congress. Surely not the citizens who pay the bills. After ten years, with no difference between domestic “protected” and unprotected venues, anyone with even the slightest clue about statistics and risk assessment would come to the conclusion that the trillions we have spent have been excessive. While we might be able to write that off as an expensive overreaction driven by nothing but emotion, there is absolutely no excuse to continue the charade.

We are hominids. We’re supposed to be able to learn and alter our behavior given additional input, data, and experience. It’s time, people.

(Photo: Flickr/limaoscarjuliet)

Tagged as: Airport, FOIA, Opt Out, Security, Travel, TSA